


candid

by aninsidejoke (speakingincode)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Pre-Slash, and tsukishima unfortunately likes yamaguchi, mutual Having It Bad, yamaguchi likes annoying tsukishima
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-17 21:30:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20627849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speakingincode/pseuds/aninsidejoke
Summary: Sometimes, when Tsukishima isn’t looking, Yamaguchi steals his phone and takes pictures of him.





	candid

**Author's Note:**

> this is a drabble request for [gil](https://twitter.com/Gilrael92)!! tkym + photo. it got a little out of hand so i decided to post it here. thanks for sending in a request gil, i had way more fun than i thought i would! i really hope you enjoy it 💚💚💚
> 
> also real quick, thanks to [adél](https://ao3.org/users/bananasloth) for the title and..... basically everything :''')

Sometimes, when Tsukishima isn’t looking, Tadashi steals his phone and takes pictures of him.

They’re not weird. Mostly, they’re really cool, like when they’re studying in the library and the lighting from the window casts a perfect shadow over the side of his face so it looks like he’s discovering a new kind of DNA or solving global warming. Or when Tsukishima’s making a weird face, like when Tsukishima gets Hinata or Kageyama mad and they all start arguing or he just heard someone say something dumb. Tsukishima doesn’t like those pictures the most, but it’s a little of fun to make him annoyed sometimes, so he keeps taking them.

Tadashi takes other pictures on Tsukishima’s phone, too, like selfies where he smiles with his teeth showing because it’s the kind of stupid and harmless thing Tsukishima lets him get away with, but the ones that Tadashi has the most fun with are the cool pictures he takes when Tsukishima isn’t paying attention.

Tadashi’s thinking about this while he’s watching Tsukishima eat shortcake in that funny hyper-focused way he does whenever they go out somewhere new, like every second he’s eating he’s holding the taste up against the price, and it also… doesn’t really make sense, that he’s thinking about it. Cool isn’t really the word Tadashi would use to describe him right now, the little bit of whipped cream smeared on the side of his mouth while he’s wrinkling his nose in concentration, but it matches the rising feeling that makes him grab Tsukishima’s phone before he realizes, at times like this. Like when you’re outside around sunset and the sky is so many pretty colors you have to stop in the middle of the sidewalk to take a picture because you’re afraid of losing the chance to.

Tsukishima left his phone face-up on the café table between them – too out in the open; he’s really just letting Tadashi do things like this now because it makes him happy, which is funny and nice and really like him in a way people don’t usually get – and Tadashi snatches it up, then, finds the best angle in a second the way he’s already perfected, and takes the picture.

And it’s really nice, Tadashi thinks, if it’s not exactly cool. The light in the café is soft, and Tadashi likes when Tsukishima wrinkles his nose like that, how it reminds him of a grumpy rabbit. The whipped cream by his mouth is funny, too, in a way that makes Tadashi’s chest get warm when he laughs. While he looks at it, Tadashi kind of wishes he took the picture on his own phone, but just as he’s about to reach for it, Tsukishima wipes his mouth and shoots Tadashi an exaggeratedly irritated look.

Tadashi immediately relocks the phone then and sets it back on the table, flashing him the big grin he always sends Tsukishima’s way when he catches him doing something just to annoy him. “How’s the cake, Tsukki?” he asks, changing the subject as subtly as he can. “My coffee’s pretty good!”

Tsukishima frowns at him like he knows exactly what he’s doing, and then shakes his head and says, “It’s fine. A little bland, but it’s not bad.”

Just lightly, Tadashi laughs.

【 ☾ 】

Later that day, about an hour after Tadashi gets back to his apartment, Tsukishima sends him a text asking if he’s home that has nine attached images. When he gets the notification, he smiles a little bit to himself.

It’s the reason that Tadashi still takes all those pictures with his phone. Tsukishima likes pretending he’s annoyed at the things that Tadashi does, but when it comes down to it, he always ends up somehow letting him know he doesn’t really mind. Tadashi still remembers the first time he decided to do it, when Tsukishima sent him a bunch of irritated texts about why he secretly took pictures of him with his own phone, but after when Tadashi asked him to send them to him, he did it.

Tadashi always looks forward to this text after they hang out, especially on the too-long walks home after they part ways at the train station, and after the picture he took at the café, he’s really excited today. But when he opens the text, some of the pictures are missing.

And that’s— not abnormal. Tsukishima sends him all the pictures that have him in them, and he was able to talk Tsukishima into sending him all the cool ones after he kept saying he should be a model and then promised to never mention it again if Tsukishima gave him the photos after he asked. But he’s never gotten Tsukishima to send him the ones where he makes weird faces, which is fine since he only takes those to annoy him anyway.

Except when he scrolls through the pictures in the text – the selfie he took when he was waiting for Tsukishima to come back from the restroom, the one he took of Tsukishima looking out the window while they were riding the bus to the café – the only one he really wanted is missing.

_tsukki!!! can u send the one where ur eating cake!!! _he sends without thinking, and then he reads the messages above it. _also yes im home are u? :o_

After a minute, his phone buzzes. _i told you i don’t like sending you the pictures like that. didn’t you say you don’t want them anyway. i got home a while ago._

Tadashi frowns. He guesses it makes sense that he thinks Tadashi was making fun of him, but when he saw it he must have realized how nice it was. _no thats my favorite one!! its really good!!! can u send it_

Tsukishima responds in a second this time. _i’m not sending you a picture of me with food on my face, yamaguchi._

_please!! _Tadashi sends back, and he thinks he can hear Tsukishima sighing as the chat bubble pops up, but eventually it goes away and Tadashi realizes he’s done with the conversation.

He sends a quick _:’(_ and decides to bother Tsukishima about it tomorrow.

【 ☾ 】

Tsukishima puts his phone down on his desk when he sees Tadashi heading towards him before homeroom starts, and Tadashi seizes his chance.

Before Tsukishima can say anything, Tadashi plucks the phone from the desk, and when he opens it, it’s still unlocked.

“You’re not going to find anything, Yamaguchi,” Tsukishima says, sighing at him a little too heavily. “I deleted it already. Why do you like that picture so much, anyway?”

“Eh, really?” Tadashi asks, and his heart sinks in a way that doesn’t make a lot of sense. He sees Tsukishima every day and it was just a picture, but… he really thought that was the best one he’s ever taken, the way it stirred something in his chest every time he looked at it.

“Of course I did. I know you’re like this,” he says, and then holds his hand out for Tadashi to give him his phone back.

It hits him them that Tsukishima could be pulling off some elaborate ploy, and Tadashi turns away from him then to look back down at phone, navigate to the gallery app, and open it.

“What are you doing? I already told you it’s not there.”

Tsukishima is leaning over him now, reaching past Tadashi’s shoulder to take his phone back in a way more aggressive than he usually deals with anything, but before he grabs it, Tadashi sees it.

Tsukishima wasn’t lying, which makes sense because Tsukishima doesn’t really lie about things like that and he had no reason to keep the picture anyway, but when Tadashi scrolls through his pictures, he sees he’s deleted most of the pictures Tadashi takes. The cool ones, the weird ones, the ones where he’s fighting with Hinata and Kageyama. And it’s a little upsetting, because Tadashi thinks he could have used those if he ever did want to be a model because he’d make a really great one, but also…

Tsukishima hasn’t deleted any of his selfies. There are dozens of pictures of him, smiling normally, sticking his tongue out, making stupid hand signs, all the way down his gallery, and it doesn’t really make sense, because he doesn’t know why he would keep all his silly one-second selfies, and also it makes his face heat up, and—

Tsukishima finally snatches it back then, and when Tadashi looks at him his cheeks are a violent shade of pink, and they sit there quietly for a moment until Tadashi says, “You didn’t delete my—”

“The pictures you take of me,” Tsukishima cuts him off, unable to look at him. “You keep them after I send them to you, don’t you? It’s the same thing.”

“That’s—” Tadashi starts to say, because it doesn’t feel the same, somehow, but it’s not like Tadashi’s really creeped out or anything, because he took those pictures, it’s just that— it’s just that his cheeks are hot, and… maybe Tsukishima is right, because he does have a special folder that he named _tsukki’s modeling portfolio_, and… “You’re right, I think.”

“I am,” Tsukishima says. “Don’t think too hard about it.”

And Tadashi tries not to, but if his heart is pounding in his chest and a weird jittery feeling follows him around the rest of the day, it’s not something he can help.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!! whether or not you liked it, it'd mean a lot if you could let me know how you felt, here or on [twitter](https://twitter.com/jailsgrr/) if you prefer it! but thanks either way 💕💕💕


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